A few months ago, incidentally, he made similar statements. In
the aftermath of another tragic
shooting earlier in the year — at a Charleston,
South Carolina, church in which nine were killed — Obama
spoke out about a recent scourge of gun violence in the
US.

"Once again, innocent people were killed in part because
someone who wanted to inflict harm had no trouble getting their
hands on a gun," Obama said.

Later, he added a point he has made before: "At some point, we
as a country will have to reckon with the fact that this type of
mass violence does not happen in other developed countries."

(Note: All countries' data from 2013, except for South Korea,
Israel, Chile, and Turkey, which are from 2012.)

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Obama has spoken at length before about Australia's
successes in combating gun violence after instituting stricter
gun measures following a 1996 mass shooting. Its rate of homicide
per 100,000 people fell below 1.1 in 2013.

"A couple of decades ago Australia had a mass shooting similar to
Columbine or Newtown, and Australia just said, 'Well, that's it.
We're not doing — we're not seeing that again,' and basically
imposed very severe, tough gun laws, and they haven't had a mass
shooting since," Obama said last June.

"I mean, our levels of gun violence are off the charts.
There's no advanced, developed country on Earth that would put up
with this."

Japan and its low homicide rates are also often cited in contrast with those of
the US. Japan strictly controls gun ownership, and supporters of
stricter gun regulations in the US often hold it up as an
example. By contrast, the US has the highest firearm-ownership
rate in the world.